THE HAND
For the rest of her life, Emily Carter would remember that Lily stopped crying before anyone else understood why.
The chapel at Hollis & Reed had been almost empty.
Daniel’s parents had stepped outside with Emily’s sister. The funeral director was speaking quietly to an employee near the rear doors. Someone had turned the overhead lights down because Emily had complained that the full brightness made Daniel look less like himself.
Only Emily and Lily remained beside the coffin.
Daniel had been dead for thirty-six hours.
That sentence had been repeated so often that it had begun to feel less like information than architecture.
Daniel was dead.
Therefore Emily had signed forms.
Daniel was dead.
Therefore she had selected a suit.
Daniel was dead.
Therefore she had answered questions about flowers, music, burial plots and whether his wedding ring should remain on his hand.
Facts accumulated beneath the first fact.
None of them were supposed to move.
Lily had not accepted any of it.
At two years old, she understood absence better than death.
Daddy was asleep.
Daddy was cold.
Daddy would wake up when he heard her.
Emily had tried explanations.
Daddy’s body stopped working.
Daddy cannot wake up.
Daddy loved you very much.
Lily listened with the grave concentration children sometimes gave adults when adults were clearly saying something foolish.
Then she asked to see him again.
Emily lifted her.
Lily immediately reached for Daniel.
“Just a kiss,” Emily whispered.
She should not have allowed what happened next.
She knew that later.
At the time, she was tired enough that boundaries had become difficult to maintain.
Lily twisted from her arms, planted one knee against the padded edge inside the coffin and leaned across Daniel’s chest.
“Lily.”
The child wrapped both arms around her father.
Emily’s throat closed.
Daniel looked almost convincing.
That was the cruelty of good funeral work.
His dark hair had been arranged the way he wore it at weddings. The bruising near his jaw had been concealed. His lips no longer carried the gray-blue shade Emily remembered from the emergency department.
His hands rested across his abdomen.
Emily had refused embalming.
The funeral director had gently explained that a delayed viewing would be easier if they proceeded.
Emily had refused again.
Daniel had been thirty-eight years old.
Healthy.
He had collapsed without warning.
The hospital’s toxicology screen was incomplete.
She wanted nothing irreversible done until she understood why her husband had died.
So the funeral home refrigerated him and performed only the preparation necessary for a short family viewing.
Now Lily put one tiny hand against Daniel’s chest.
“Daddy.”
Emily reached for her.
Lily kissed his cheek.
“Please don’t leave me.”
Emily looked away.
That was why she nearly missed it.
Lily went silent.
Not quieter.
Silent.
Emily turned back.
Her daughter was staring at Daniel’s right hand.
“Mommy.”
“What?”
Lily pointed.
Daniel’s index finger was bent.
Emily frowned.
She had spent enough time beside the coffin that she knew the position of his hands.
She also knew what grief did.
Grief invented breaths beneath blankets.
Grief heard keys in locks.
Grief turned plumbing noises into footsteps.
“Come here, sweetheart.”
Lily did not move.
“Daddy touched me.”
Emily put both hands beneath her arms.
Then Daniel’s finger moved.
Emily stopped.
There were categories the mind possessed for almost everything a person might see.
This belonged to none of them.
His hand jerked faintly.
Not the loose movement of the coffin being bumped.
Not a trick of fabric.
His fingers moved toward Lily’s hand.
Emily stepped backward so abruptly that her hip struck a chair.
The sound brought funeral director Samuel Reed across the chapel.
“Mrs. Carter?”
Emily could not answer.
Lily held Daniel’s hand.
Then Daniel’s fingers closed around hers.
Samuel stopped.
For several seconds nobody moved.
Lily looked up.
“He got me.”
Samuel crossed the remaining distance.
Emily pushed past him and grabbed Daniel’s wrist.
Cold skin.
She pressed two fingers beneath his jaw.
Nothing.
She moved them.
Still nothing.
“Daniel.”
Samuel leaned over the coffin.
Emily lowered her face toward Daniel’s mouth.
There might have been air.
There could not have been air.
She straightened.
“Call 911.”
Samuel was already moving.
Emily pressed harder against Daniel’s neck.
“Come on.”
Nothing.
Then—
Something.
A flutter so slight she might have created it with her own fingertips.
“Daniel?”
His eyes remained closed.
She put her palm flat against his chest.
No obvious movement.
No breath she could trust.
Lily tugged his hand.
“Wake up.”
Emily pulled her daughter away.
This time Lily fought her.
“No!”
“Sweetheart, let me look at Daddy.”
“He wants me.”
“Lily.”
“He held me!”
“I know.”
The words came out broken.
“I know.”
Samuel returned.
“They’re coming.”
Emily turned on him.
“How long?”
“Minutes.”
“Get the AED.”
He stared at her.
“Get it.”
He ran.
Emily had taken a CPR course when Lily was born.
She remembered instructors explaining cardiac arrest.
She remembered compressions.
Breaths.
Electrical shock.
She remembered learning that dead people could display reflexive movements shortly after death.
But Daniel had not died minutes ago.
He had been declared dead the previous morning.
His body had been transferred to hospital refrigeration, then released.
She had touched his face when the funeral home received him.
She had watched Samuel verify the identification band.
Thirty-six hours.
She placed her ear against Daniel’s chest.
Nothing.
Then she heard sirens.
By the time the paramedics entered, Emily was standing beside the coffin with Lily screaming in her arms.
The first paramedic was a woman named Cara Brennan.
Emily would later remember her because Cara did not waste time telling anyone the situation was impossible.
She climbed onto the platform beside the coffin.
“What did you see?”
“His hand moved.”
“Once?”
“Three times. He squeezed my daughter.”
Cara touched Daniel’s neck.
Her partner opened equipment.
“Was he embalmed?”
“No.”
Cara glanced at Emily.
“Why not?”
“Toxicology.”
The paramedic nodded once.
“Help me get him flat.”
Samuel said, “He’s been refrigerated.”
“I heard you.”
They moved Daniel out of the coffin and onto the chapel floor.
It felt obscene.
Necessary and obscene.
His suit jacket opened.
Leads went onto his chest.
Cara watched the monitor.
Her expression changed.
“What?” Emily asked.
Nobody answered.
“What?”
Cara adjusted one lead.
Her partner looked over.
“Artifact?”
“Maybe.”
Emily stepped closer.
Cara held up one hand.
“Mrs. Carter, stay there.”
The monitor changed again.
Emily saw lines she did not understand.
Cara did.
“We have electrical activity.”
Samuel whispered something that sounded like prayer.
Emily stared at the paramedic.
“That’s impossible.”
“I know what you were told.”
“He’s dead.”
Cara reached again for Daniel’s neck.
Her eyes stayed on the monitor.
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“I need everybody quiet.”
The room obeyed.
Cara moved her fingers slightly.
Then again.
Her partner crouched beside her.
“I might have something.”
Emily stopped breathing.
Cara said, “So do I.”
She looked at her partner.
“Get the stretcher.”
Emily tightened both arms around Lily.
Daniel’s face had changed.
Or perhaps hers had.
His lips looked less gray.
“Is he alive?”
Cara did not answer the question directly.
“We are treating him as a living patient.”
The sentence struck Emily with such force that she had to sit down.
Lily wriggled free and ran toward Daniel.
Emily caught her before she reached him.
Paramedics lifted Daniel onto the stretcher.
Samuel opened the chapel doors.
Outside, sunlight fell across the polished wood of the empty coffin.
Daniel passed it on his way out.
Emily followed.
The ambulance doors closed with her husband inside.
She stood in the parking lot holding Lily.
Thirty-six hours earlier, St. Gabriel Medical Center had certified Daniel Carter dead.
Now an ambulance was carrying him back.